Daemones
by aadarshinah
Summary: Asuras still stands. #22 in the Ancient!John 'Verse. McShep.
1. Pars Una

_Daemones_  
_An_ Ancient!John Story

* * *

"Just the people I needed to see," Rodney announces, trying to contain the spring in his step as he enters Elizabeth's office. "You'll never guess what I-" He looks from Elizabeth, who's sitting behind her desk with a half-bemused, half-beleaguered expression, to John, who's flopped across one of her armchairs like some kind of boneless fish with an open book in his lap, and back to Elizabeth. "Am I interrupting something?"

Elizabeth gives him one of her most charming smiles. "No, not at all."

"Elizabeta's teaching me about Roman Catholicism," John tells him, lifting his head off one of the armrests and twisting around to better face him.

He raises an eyebrow at Elizabeth, who's smile remains unabashed. "Is she now?"

"She thought it might be a good idea for me to learn about various Descendant religious movements, y'know, considering I am one now. Plus," he adds, pushing himself fully upright - head against the back of the chair, feet on the floor, - "I was bored."

"Bored? How?" He's fairly certain that John and Carson have been devoting several hours a week to what the former has taken to calling 'Introduction to Alteran Anatomy 101' on the theory that knowing about how a humanoid body is supposed to work will allow him to overcome his Tactile Dysfunction. Between that, the nine or so hours he spends in daily meditation towards this end, and his normal workload, Rodney's not certain it's physically possible for the Colonel to be bored. Even without a physical body.

John just shrugs. "You'd be amazed the kind of free time you have when you don't need to sleep. Or eat. And there's only so much time you can devote to contemplating your hypothalamus before the urge to inflict bodily harm on something becomes overwhelming." He snaps his book shut. Now that Rodney can see the cover, he see's it's a copy of the Biblia Vulgata. He has absolutely no idea where John might have gotten ahold of it and, strangely, that's the most bizarre part of the whole thing.. "If you're curious, it's eighty-six hours and twelve minutes."

"I see..."

"And, before you say it, no, I can't just move on to something else. The brain is all I have left and it's just-"

Rodney raises the hand not holding the tablet. "I wasn't going to say anything," he tells him honestly.

Running a hand through his hair, "Yeah," John sighs. "Yeah, sorry. I'm not really cut out for this whole Ascended shtick, y'know."

"It's alright." They'll work through it. Somehow.

"What'd you want to show us anyway?"

"What? Oh, yes. I found something in Janus' notes about a research base he once worked on. He wasn't very clear on what research was being done and neither was the Ancient Database, but the entry did say that whatever they were working on was completed before they abandoned the outpost, probably because of the war. And," Rodney grins as he turns the tablet around to face them both, "it included a Gate address."

The smile Elizabeth gives him this time is smaller, but truer and, somehow, brighter. Clapping her hands together, "That's great Rodney. It's sounds promising.

We can probably rearrange the team schedule for to check it out-"

"No!"

"Colonel?"

"That address is for Asuras."

This, quite naturally, means nothing to him. He looks to Elizabeth on the off chance John's told her something about his people's past that he doesn't know, but it's no dice there either.

John shakes his head, his eyes glowing with a bright white light that casts no shadows. "Remember what I was saying about how my people gave a new meaning to nuclear holocaust when we destroyed the planet we built our Replicators on?"

Rodney nods. John had only ever mentioned the Pegasus version of Replicators once, when they were on their way to bring Aurora back home, but that kind of thing tends to stick with a person.

"Well that," he points at the tablet, "is the address. We called it Asuras."

"I'm sorry, but did you just say 'Replicators'?" Elizabeth asks, slightly shrill.

"I- We tried a lot of things to stop the Wraith. The Asurans - that's what we called them - were the end result of a micro-weapon that Father worked on when he was only a discipulus. They're more like the human-form Replicators SG-1 encountered on Hala than the originals. But, look, like I told Rodney, we decimated their planet. Nothing could have survived the damage we inflicted upon it. Not even a nanite."

Elizabeth's lips purse. "Are you absolutely certain?"

He bites his lower lip. "If any had survived... They weren't the mindless replicating servola Avalon's Replicators were. The Asurans, the aggression we created in them terrified even Father. He'd have nightmares sometimes - and this a man who built doomsday machines on a fairly regular basis." John shudders.

"Needless say, if they'd survived, there'd not be much left alive in Pegasus today. Especially not the Wraith."

"Well, that's terrifying," Rodney says, sinking onto the arm of John's chair.

His amator wraps an arm around his waist, more tightly than is strictly necessary for added stability. "My people took care of them long ago."

"Be that as it may," Elizabeth says, thin-lipped and fiery-eyed, "we should still try dialling the address, just to see for ourselves."

"Go right ahead. I'll be surprised if we can even get a lock."

* * *

They get a lock.

* * *

They pick up a radio signal less than two minutes later, while the techs are still preparing the MALP.

"I am speaking to whoever seeks to contact this world," says the voice that plays from the speakers. It's silted and somewhat formal - not in the way that speaks of machine-aided translation on both sides, which is to say, artificially so, - but in a way that suggests a truly straight-laced character is on the opposite end of the transmission. "If you can understand this message and come in friendship, please speak. If not, or if you mean us harm, proceed no further. This is the only warning you will receive."

Rodney snorts. "Friendly bunch, aren't they?"

"Whatever you do, don't let them know you're not Alteran. I really don't want to know what they'll do if they find out." John pushes away from the console he's been leaning against with a great sigh. Then he closes his eyes and, when he opens them again, everything about him has changed - nothing physically. He's still outfitted in the same crazy mix of Ancient and Expedition uniform. He still seems to bend all the light towards him but remain in shadows. And yet-

-and yet his whole bearing has changed. Everything about him is straighter. Harder. Colder. More like the Ancients Rodney had seen hooked into Aurora's neural network and less like the man who'd tumbled out of bed with him this morning.

This John raises a hand stiffly to his radio and taps it once. "This is Iohannes Ianideus Licinus Pastor, Praetor of Atlantis. I demand dialogue with the one that speaks for your kind."

There is a startled silence on both ends of the wormhole.

"Colonel," Elizabeth hisses on theirs, "you could at least try for a little diplomacy."

The look John gives her is almost the same one he gets when she talks about trying to negotiate with the Wraith or maybe reduce the amount of C4 they use on missions. Almost. Nevertheless, he relents, though his put upon look is a little too disgusted to be the their John. "Look, I don't mean you guys any harm," he says, nearly sounding like himself. "All I want to do right now is talk to you."

"Atlantis Fell," the voice on the other side of the wormhole says brusquely. "She was lost to the sea ten thousand years ago, struck down by the Wraith."

"Atlantis still stands."

"And what of Elorus and Tiranus? Do they still stand as well?"

"No," John admits, real sadness creeping into his voice, though his tone remains somewhat distant and formal - and wrong.

"Then Atlantis and Asuras are all that remain."

Something twitches in John's jaw. "You could say that."

There's another pause. When the voice returns, Rodney would almost call it plaintive. "Why have you not tried to contact us before now, Pastor?"

"I didn't know Asuras still stood."

"Yes." There's definitely something sorrowful in the man's voice now. "The others held us responsible for the deaths of Elernus Ival Asuras Rector and Ishachus Ival Magister, amongst many others. They sought to destroy our world in retribution."

The muscle in John's jaw twitches again. "But you did not?"

"Of course not. We cannot harm our creators. Their deaths were an unfortunate accident." A pause. "Our Rector, Oberoth, would like to speak with you. Would thirty standard hours from now be enough time for you to make the appropriate preparations?"

John glances at Elizabeth. Apart from the stiffness to his back and the tightness in his jaw, he looks almost normal again.

She nods.

"That works for us-" he hesitates. "What's your name, anyway?"

"I am called Niam," the voice tells them, clearly surprised. Then, hesitantly, "If I might ask, your gens, it is Nebrian, is it not?"

John blinks-

-and whatever is left of the mask he he'd been wearing just crumbles away, and he is John again. Their John. His John.

"Yes," John admits, for whatever it's worth.

"Then you are the son of Ianus Ishachidus Ianitos Ingeniarius."

"He was Rector at his death."

"I see," Niam says delicately, remorsefully. "I know we cannot hope to redress the injuries my kind have caused you, but know that the deaths of Elernus and Ishachus Ival were truly accidents. All of us mourned their deaths."

"I- Thanks, Niam."

"Until tomorrow."

Then the wormhole disconnects, seemingly of its own accord, and chaos ensues.

* * *

They wind up back in Elizabeth's office.

"Why do I get the feeling that there's something you're not telling us, Colonel?" she fumes, practically throwing herself into her chair.

Rodney, to his surprise, just finds himself rollings eyes as he moves the bible out of the seat John had vacated earlier. "This is John we're talking about," he reminds her, slumping into his own chair. "He never tells us everything. I don't know why you still bother to get mad about it."

John gives him a hurt look from the - closed - doorway he's leaning against. "I tell you the important stuff."

"Yes, well your definition of important and ours tend to differ somewhat."

"Yes," Elizabeth agrees. "For starters, how did Niam know who you are, or, at least, who your father was?"

"My paternal grandmother was a Nebrian refugee," John says like it explains everything. Which, to him, it probably does.

"I'm going to need a little bit more than that, Colonel."

It's John's turn to roll his eyes. "My gens is Ianideus - literally, 'the son Ianus.' Not a lot of folks outside Nebrius named their children that way. Not a lot of folks called 'Ianus' either."

Elizabeth pinches the bridge of her nose. "And these people they supposedly killed?"

"The main researchers on the project: brothers, Elernus Ival Asuras Rector and Ishachus Ival Magister. They, along with twenty-six others, died during a massive explosion in 80 AL. It was believed that the Asurans were behind it."

Rodney frowns. "I thought you said the Asurans were programmed not to harm you guys. Asimov's Three Laws, or something."

"Not directly, no."

"But indirectly's just fine?"

"Apparently," John shrugs. "Also, in the interest of full disclosure, now might be a good time to mention Ishachus Ival was my paternal grandfather."

"And you didn't think it was relevant to mention this before?" Elizabeth asks, just this side of snapping.

"Look, by the time my people reached Pegasus, there were barely ten thousand of us left. By the Exodus, that number was barely a hundred, and I'm related to each and every one of them in dozens of ways: So, yes, my grandfather and his brother created the Asurans. I'm also sixth cousins with Ganos and Moros Lal. And I'm sure if we ever stumble across anything else in this galaxy my people built, I'll be related to whoever's involved there too.

"But it doesn't mean anything. My grandfather died twenty-five years before I was born. Ganos barely spoke to me, and I'm fairly certain Moros never acknowledged my existence at all until my first court marshal.

"So can you just accept this so we can all move on? 'Cause we've got less than thirty hours until we're due on Asuras, and I'm going to need that time to train whoever we decide to send with me to act Alteran, or this whole thing is going to go in a puff of smoke faster than you can say 'genocide'."


	2. Pars Dua

Daemones  
An Ancient!John Story

* * *

Pars Dua

* * *

He steps out of the bedroom muttering, "God, I look like an idiot."

John pushes himself up onto his elbows, smile splitting his face as he looks Rodney over from head to toe and back again. "Yeah," he admits, "you kinda do."

"Says the man lying on the floor," Rodney snorts. "Why are you on the floor anyway?"

"Floors are as much a part of Atlantis as ceilings."

"Okay," he says at length, for lack of any better response. "But are the dead peoples' clothes really necessary?"

John rolls his eyes before pillowing his head in his arms again, nose inches from the hideous as hell (but surprisingly soft) rug the folks on Saritos gave them a few months back. "It's not like there's any place to get new Alteran clothing these days. We're lucky that Father's stuff fits you."

"You know that's not what I mean."

"I know," he says quietly.

Rodney crosses the room and, after a moment, sits cross-legged on the rug in front of him. It's a little uncomfortable, as Ancient clothes turn out to be more closely tailored than the stuff one gets off the rack on Earth, but there's not much he can do about that now. "You're really worried about this, aren't you?"

"What d'you think? The last thing we need right now is more bad guys, but here they are, popping out of the woodwork like mice in a barn fire."

"You never know. That Niam guy seemed genuinely worked up about what happened to your grandfather. And is has been ten thousand years since anyone's heard a peep out of them. Maybe they really have changed."

"You don't really believe that."

"I don't know what I believe - I've not met them yet.

"So, yeah, maybe we're making a huge mistake by going to Asuras. Maybe they'll try to kill us or torture us for information the moment we get there. But maybe they really didn't kill all those people, and maybe they're not the evil creatures you were told stories about anymore, if they ever were. The one thing I do know, though, is that you'll hate yourself forever if we attack now and find out later that they weren't bad guys. So what do you say we do this, try to stay alive, and deal with the fall out later?"

John raises himself up on a single elbow and gives him a warm smile. "When did you get so smart?"

He huffs. "I've always been this smart. You just weren't paying close enough attention. The question you should be asking is: when did our roles get reversed?"

"Roles?"

"It used to be you reassuring me about the 'this is probably a bad idea' missions we went go on," Rodney points out, "and now it's the other way around."

John's mouth quirks upward on one side. "C'mere," he mutters, tugging on the front of Rodney's jacket when he's close enough and pulling him down further. He kisses him once, just a soft brush of lips, before pulling back slightly and bringing his hand up to cup Rodney's face. "I can't die," John whispers, and Rodney can feel the breath on his cheek, the brush of a nose against his. "No matter what happens, I'm going to continue to exist until the others release me from this punishment. Before I Ascended, I knew that, if something happened to me, you'd either manage to survive or be not that far behind. But now," he breathes, voice wavering, "no matter what I do, I'm going to lose you someday. So forgive me if I want to make sure that day is as far off as possible."

"John..."

"You have no idea how terrifying it is to want to do anything for someone and actually be able to do it."

Rodney's breath hitches, the tip of his nose brushing against John's cheek - and, God, he feels real. He doesn't feel like a lightning storm - an atomic bomb, an earthquake - wrapped up in one human-shaped package. He doesn't feel like a being people could rightfully call a god. He just feels like John, his (more or less) live-in boyfriend, right down to the stubble on his cheek.

But that stubble never grows and, if John wanted to, he could could wipe an area the size of Maine off the map just by thinking about it. And Rodney is slowly coming to the realisation that John would do just that if he ever felt it necessary, regardless of the consequences.

"Hey, I save you, you save me, remember?" he tells him. "You didn't need your Ascended powers to do that before, and you certainly don't need them now."

John chuckles. "I make no guarantees."

"Well you should," tells him, pulling back. "You told me what the others threatened to do if you went Dark Side. Don't put all those deaths on my hands."

John kisses him, hard, and repeats, "I make no guarantees," before pulling away. In seconds, he's on his feet and shaking out the wrinkles in his clothing. "We should see how Elizabeta is getting on."

"John-"

"Fine. I promise to kill the Asurans the old-fashioned way if it comes down to it."

Rodney grins as he climbs to his own feet. "That's all I ask. God," he groans, fixing his own clothes. There are no less than three layers of cream-coloured clothing involved in the costume, the last of which inclues a jacket with a collar so high the back brushes his hairline. "I can't believe you used to dress like this all the time."

The Ancient snorts and takes over, smoothing out the shoulders of the jacket and checking the laces of the leather sewn into the cuffs. "These are civilian clothes."

"There are lifts in these boots John."

He 'hmmms'. "Father may have been a bit chichi."

"'A bit?'" Rodney snorts. "You know, the more I learn about your dad, the happier I get that I never have to worry about meeting him."

John's bark of laughter seems to surprise even himself. "I think," he says with false solemnity, "the entire universe is grateful for that."

* * *

Elizabeth meets them in the Gate Room, wearing what probably passes for the Ancient equivalent of a business suit - that is to say, something highly-tailored and blindingly white, with an odd square collar and lacings down the front, like some sort of Bavarian bodice or something. Unlike Rodney, who feels nothing but incredibly awkward in this Ancient getup, she looks every ounce of the accomplished and acclaimed diplomat her portfolio boasts. It's sometimes hard to remember, but she'd been negotiating treaties with warlords and dictators on Earth long before she'd been questioning on their every action from her glass office on high.

Okay, maybe that's a little harsh, but this mission will only be the second trip she's made off-world since they arrived on Lantea - third, if one included the one back to Earth they'd made at the end of the first year. And while she sits in her ivory tower, passing judgement on them for their choices after the fact, she doesn't get that, sometimes, they have to act on what information they have at the moment - that they don't have time when they're being shot at to sit down and discuss every option to death's doorstep and beyond.

Hell, Rodney knows it's hypocritical - he's not gotten it either until he'd started going off-world on a regular basis, - but he can't help but think it. Despite her faults, few as they are, Elizabeth an excellent head of this Expedition. There may be others who could do the job better, but Rodney wouldn't have any of them. None of them have earned his respect, let alone his friendship.

He still wishes she'd learn already.

She smiles at him. "Why Rodney, don't you look nice."

"I look like an idiot."

"No-"

"Actually," John interrupts, "he kinda does. But then again rectores are kinda supposed to look like pompous, pretentious asses. No offense, buddy."

Rodney snorts. He feels like a pompous, pretentious ass.

"Do you think these clothes will actually fool the Asurans?" Elizabeth asks.

"Not on their own. Just remember what I told you both last night and let me do most the talking. Hopefully, that will be enough."

"You don't sound very sure."

"Like I said," he shrugs, "we thought we'd taken care of them long before I was ever born. The only reason I know anything about them at all is because Father worked on the project, but he was only a discipulus then and it's not like I ever paid much attention to any of the science stuff he went on about."

Elizabeth looks at him for translation. Because, yes, after all these years, he's still the only one who knows what John's saying some of the time. Sometimes, he thinks John even does it intentionally, just so he doesn't feel left out or something absurd like that. "He means his dad was only an undergrad. Maybe a young grad student. It's not exactly a one-to-one ratio, but basically Janus was still at the short end of the academic hierarchy at the time." Which, oddly enough reminds Rodney of something. Turning back to John, he asks, "Wasn't your great-uncle's nickname 'Asuras'?"

"One was named after the other," he says distractedly, waving Ronon and Teyla over.

Both are dressed normally, the unspoken agreement being that there is no way either could hope to pass for an Ancient. Part of it is the simple fact that, while human life the universe over had apparently evolved from the same Petri dish of genetic material that the Ancients had seeded wherever they went, the people of Athos and Sateda hadn't gotten the same boost of fresh DNA John's father had given ancient Earth. They're too many generations removed from the source to really pass for a pair of their Ancestors. The other part - the greater one - is that neither of them have it in them to be the self-important, pretentious sons of bitches John makes his people out to be, not by a long shot. Whereas Rodney - and maybe Elizabeth, if she tries - does.

Rodney can't help but be unbearably annoyed. But, before he can complain about the outfit again, it's zero hour, and Chuck's dialling the Gate.

Showtime.

* * *

Three Asurans - a blonde man and two dark-haired women dressed as pretentiously as Rodney feels - are waiting for them when they step out of the Gate.

The man steps forward and bows slightly. "I am Niam," he says, features schooled but voice just this side of giddy. "These are Quirin and Rhoda. We most graciously welcome you to Asuras."

"Nice to meet you guys," he says in a genuinely friendly voice, and either he's genuinely decided to reserve judgement until he gets to know them better or John's a much better actor than they give him credit for. "I'm Iohannes Ianideus Licinus Pastor, the guy you were talking to the other day."

The younger of the two women smiles at this. "Yes. We recognised your voice, Pastor." Her own is oddly low-pitched for a woman's, but not unpleasantly so - more like a dramatic contralto in an opera house than his chain-smoking grand-mère, who had a tendency to sound like she gargled sandpaper in the years before her death.

"You bear remarkable resemblance to your grandfather, Ishachus Magister, as well," says the older. If the first was a dramatic contralto, she is a lyric soprano, with a youthful sweetness to her voice not usually found in a woman of her presumable age.

Rodney wonders if the Asurans sing as Atlantis does and, if so, that might change anything in John's mind.  
Judging by the tightness in John's jaw, he rather doubts it - at least, for as long as they keep bringing up the relatives they're believed to have murdered. "So I've been told."

"Forgive Quirin," Niam says, taking another step further. "We hold our creators in such esteem that we have given little thought to the... less practical side-effects of their deaths."

"Yeah. Well, maybe you should've. My father and his cousin weren't the only ones you orphaned that day."

Elizabeth makes a less than discrete cough.

"Oh, yeah. Introductions. This is Elizabeta Molia Praefecta."

"It is a pleasure to meet you, Praefecta," Niam tells her, inclining his head respectfully.

"And I you."

"And this," John continues quickly before she can say more. "is Moreducus Ignius Custodia, our rector."

Niam and the others bow, even more deeply than he had for John. "Rector, it is truly an honour."

"Yes, it probably is," Rodney tells them, channelling his inner snark - though even he admits he doesn't have to dig that deep looking for the proper, Ancient-y response.

John grins at him. "And Teyla Emmagen and Ronon Dex."

"Servants?"

The muscle in John's jaw twitches. Twice. "Friends."

The Asurans' eyes widen, Niam's almost comically so. "Much must have changed for Lanteans to speak of Descendants with friendship."

"You could say that."

"Oberoth will not like that."

"Why not?" Elizabeth asks, first ignoring and then brushing aside the elbow Rodney had dug into her side at the first sign she was going to speak. He'll be the first to admit that he's done and said some not-so-smart things off-world before, but when John wants them to shut the hell up to avoid getting killed by extraordinarily violent machines, well, Rodney's inclined to do as the Ancient asks;

Replicators freak him out on a level he's not even prepared to think about. They're little better than viruses, mindlessly eating their way across the universe with no other thought than continued replication through whatever means necessary. And while yes, the Asurans seem to be of a decidedly different flavour - they've obviously a high level of intelligence, if the way their city mimics Atlantis is anything to go by, - on some level, Rodney knows they're the same mindless machines the Milky Way Replicators were. They cannot alter their code. They cannot change. They were programmed to be ruthless weapons in the war against the Wraith, and weapons they remain.

Or maybe they can. These three at least seem peaceable enough. No one's tried to kill them yet, which is always a plus in Rodney's book, especially considering their reputation.

But the point he's trying to make is they don't know yet. And Elizabeth is going to get herself and all the rest of them killed if she keeps this up. Or, even worse, she'll do something that causes John to use his Ascended powers, and then a whole bunch of other people will die. Either way, people die if they screw this up.

Which is a good incentive for not screwing things up.

"He still blames you for the near-destruction of our race. Rightly so, perhaps, but he does not allow himself to see the whole picture. Mistakes were made on both sides. We cannot hope to grow as a race if we continue to cling to the past, particularly one so distorted as to make us appear blameless in all things."

Niam cocks his head to one side. "We should go now. It is a long walk to the Council Chambers and it will be held against all of us if we are not punctual."

"You hold no animosity towards the Ancestors for what they did to you," Teyla observes as Niam leads them through the eerily familiar halls of Asuras.

Rodney briefly considers elbowing her as well, but knows he'd probably not survive it.

"Oh no," Niam tells her. "They most certainly perceived the death of their researchers as the first act of a war they had no desire to fight. We ourselves were created as but sophisticated weapons in the war they were already losing against the Wraith. Between the losses they had already suffered and the aggression they imbued in us, they had no hope of winning a protracted war against us. I am sure they saw a swift, uncompromising attack ending in what appeared to be our utter destruction to be their only hope for survival. I am sure we would have done the same, had our situations been reversed. After all, we were created in their image, just as you were."

"But not everyone agrees with you," Elizabeth says.

"Forgiveness is not a part of our programming. Revenge is."

"And yet we have yours."

Niam cocks his head to the side again. "Yes," he muses, sounding rather surprised. "I suppose that is true."

John, notably, says nothing. He just walks alongside him, silent and brooding, and with that same faraway look he gets in his eyes when he's talking silently to 'Lantis.

* * *

Oberoth is a greying, heavy-set man who immediately takes offence to all of them.

"So," he says, eying John critically from his seat at the head of the Council Table. "You are the Ival heir."

"Well," John drawls, "I usually go by 'Iohannes,' but if that's what floats your boat, I'll answer to it."

"I must say it came as a surprise to hear that the grandson of one of our creators was, of all things, a solider. How disappointed your father must have been with you. After all, how many generations of Ivals have been rectores? Twenty-five? Thirty?"

"Does it matter?"

"That the Ival heir chose not to shoulder the great legacy his ancestors laid out for him? I'd say it matters very much, Iohannes Pastor. It tells me that you are weak, lazy, cowardly - an unworthy ally for the Asuran people."

To Rodney's everlasting surprise, John laughs. "What makes you think we'd want to ally with you? You're just malfunctioning weapons. We only came here today to see just how far the reservation you've gone before deciding what action to take."

Elizabeth steps forward. "What the Praetor means to say is, the Wraith have recently reawakened from their hibernation and are posing a greater threat to this galaxy than they have for many millennia. And while we are strong, the fight ahead of us will be easier with your assistance."

Oberoth turns his haughty gaze on her. "Eradication of the Wraith is among our goals."

"Nice job you've done with that so far," John snorts.

"No better than you."

John's hands curl into fists at his sides, but he voices no reply. But neither does he lash out with any of his Ascended powers, which could so easily level this city and everything within it, so Rodney counts it as a win.

Elizabeth continues with her line of questioning. "But you have a plan?"

"We do."

Rodney can't help himself. Clapping his hands together, "Great. Let's hear it," he half asks, half demands.

The glower Oberoth sends his way is absolutely withering. Rodney can feel himself shrinking back despite himself. "I doubt that you would be able to grasp it's complexity and scope."

He musters up the most contemptuous glare he has at his disposal, honed first by years in academia and later by decades of research for the United States Air Force. "Lucky for you, I'm very good with complexity."

"All you need to know is that one day soon the Wraith will exist no more."

"What are you waiting on, an engraved invitation? Every single Wraith in the galaxy is awake. If you don't step up and do something, pretty soon there's not going to be anybody left to save, and what good will all your plans be then? So stand up and take some initiative. You're weapons," Rodney rages, fairly certain he's lost his mind talking to a Replicator like this. "Act like it."

Oberoth arches an eyebrow. "We shall commence our plan at a time of our choosing, not before."

"You're lying."

Every eye in the room, human and Asuran, turns to look at John with varying degrees of scepticism and frustration.

"Pardon me?"

"You're lying," John says more clearly as he takes a few steps forward to stand in the middle of the Council Chambers. But his voice, for all it's sharpness, is hardly raised at all. "There is no plan to defeat the Wraith. Why would you want to do that when they're merrily causing so much misery to the Descendants of this galaxy? After all, they're the ones we showered with love and attention. They're the ones we guided down the right paths towards becoming like ourselves while we abandoned you at the first sign of trouble. You thought we were dead, and so you watched the Wraith set about destroying our favourite creations and called it revenge."

A few of the Council members, including Niam, appear as confused by this information. The rest appear furious beyond words. "How do you know this?" one of them - a grey-haired woman - demands.

Oberoth waves the question aside. "He is pastor. He must be stronger than we had anticipated to be able to slip through the city's defences. But no matter. A door once opened works both ways and his knowledge of the truth changes nothing."

"You killed thirty-eight innocent people, Oberoth. That changes everything."

"They would have killed us," the grey-haired woman insists. "They were going to destroy us. We had to destroy them first."

"Self-defence doesn't justify cold-blooded murder."

"You would condemn an entire planet for a handful of deaths?"

John doesn't say anything, but it's obvious what his answer would be.

"And what then of yourself? How many deaths can be held to your name? How many did you leave behind at the Palamede? How many did you lead to their deaths at Tirianus? Hundreds? Thousands? What punishment does a murderer of your caliber deserve?"

The scent of ozone fills the room as John's fists clench at his sides, so tightly that Rodney can make out his white knuckles from across the room. "That was battle."

"So was this," Oberoth roars, rising to his feet almost faster than the human eye can follow. "But wait," he adds more evenly, "there are far more interesting things inside your mind. Like the fact that your so called rector and praefecta aren't Alteran at all." He turns towards the guards that line the room. "Take them away."

The guards start towards them. Ronon and Teyla go for their guns, but there are no less than twenty Asurans in the Council Chambers alone. If they're anything like the Milky Way Replicators, it will take a lot more ammunition than they have to make it out of this room, let alone back to the Gate.

"You touch them," John growls, "and it won't just be your planet I destroy."

"Do you really think you can challenge us?" Oberoth scoffs. "One lone Alteran against the entire might of Asuras?"

"I think I'm the only one who can challenge you. Now tell your men to fall back or deactivate and disassemble immediately."

"Make sure to lock the Pastor up separately until we can take care of him."

One of the guards places a hand on Elizabeth's shoulder.

"I said," John's voice thunders, his fingers unfurling to reveal glowing white palms. "Deactivate." He flings his hands in opposite directions, sending two separate beams of light at the Asurans sitting at each end off the curved Council table. "And." The light envelops its targets whole once it hits them. And, when it dissipates, "Disassemble," all that is left of victims is a pile of nanites on the floor.

"Get them out of here!"

And then there is a flurry of movement.

Rodney tries to get his gun, but it's knocked out of his hand before he can get off a shot. Teyla does a little better, but even her P90 is next to useless against the onslaught of hands seeking to drag them away and she's taken as soon as she has to reload. Ronon manages to bring down three before two more manage to get the drop on him, grabbing his arms from behind before a third knocks him unconscious withe butt of his gun. Elizabeth he loses sight of entirely in mêlée, and John...

The last he sees of John is him firing more beams of light at the Asurans. But whatever compunction they have against harming their creators doesn't appear to extend to non-fatal injuries, for soon he is lost beneath a swarm of attackers, and the rest of their team is being dragged away.


	3. Pars Tria

Daemones  
An Ancient!John Story

* * *

Pars Tria

* * *

They've no sooner turned the corner before a great clap of thunder crashes all around them, shaking the entire tower.

Another quickly follows, impossibly louder, and then a third, this time accompanied by a great fusillade of lightning breaking and bursting down the halls, burning and blistering everything it touches.

It's too bright to watch. Rodney quickly buries his eyes in the crook of his elbow, pressing his hands to his ears in attempt to protect them from the deafening barrage. He doesn't know why his arms are suddenly free, only that he must do something against the onslaught. He thinks he might be on his knees, but that's immaterial with the way the floor is quaking - but that might just be him. The temperature in the hallway surges ten, fifteen degrees. The air is filled with the acrid smell of burned hair and melting plastic and if it keeps up for much longer, it's going to be impossible to breathe.

And then just as quickly as it started, it stops, the silence even more deafening than the thunder.

Cautiously, Rodney uncovers his ears. When that doesn't prove to be a heinous mistake, opens his eyes too.

He's kneeling in the middle of a nuclear winter: The walls are utterly charred. What remains of the furniture rests in piles of smouldering wreckage every few yards. The windows are all smashed, covering the floor in shards of multi-coloured glass mostly lost beneath the inch or two of ash that covers everything, even himself.

Elizabeth groans from somewhere to his right - at least, he thinks it's Elizabeth. His ears are still ringing and the sound of her agony is all but primal, nothing at all like the prim and polished diplomat of minutes before.

Slowly, carefully, he crawls towards her, hissing when a shard of glass he'd somehow missed buries itself in his palm. Rodney pulls it out as carefully as he can and tugs the sleeves of his stupid Ancient jacket down as far as they'll go, hoping the leather sewn into the cuffs will give him some protection. They do, but no where near enough, and so his fingers sport a dozen tiny cuts by the time he finally reaches her.

"Elizabeth," he coughs.

He gets no response.

"Elizabeth?" he tries again, shaking her shoulder.

This gets him an insensate moan, even more pained than the first.

Carefully, he starts brushing the ash and hair off her face. His comes away with blood, several inches of blackened hair, and pieces of charred flesh. "Elizabeth, can you hear me?" he asks, a frantic note in his voice now. He tears open his jacket and rips several inches off the hem of the shirt underneath, using the relatively cleaner cloth to dab at her wounds, but getting rid of the blood and ash only makes it look that much worse. As loudly as he dares, "Is anybody there?"

"Rodney?"

"Teyla? Is that you?"

"Yes," she chokes out around terrible, hacking coughs that make his own lungs ache with sympathy. "What was that?"

"No idea. A bomb maybe? All I know is Elizabeth is in a bad way over here. She's got some really bad burns and I think she must've hit her head when she fell, 'cause she's not waking up."

"And Ronon?"

Rodney takes a second glance through the haze of smoke. "I don't see him. Or any of the Asurans."

"Nor do I. Ron-" she pauses for another body-wracking cough. "Ronon? Are you there?"

"I'm here," he grunts in obvious pain. "What'd I miss?"

"We are not certain, but Elizabeth is hurt and, last I saw, the Replicators have John."

"We've gotta get out of here."

"No go," Rodney tells him worriedly. "Elizabeth can't walk. Hell, she won't even wake up." She needs medical attention soon or there's no telling what state she'll be in when sh wakes up.

If she wakes up.

"We're dead if we stay here."

There's no denying that, but, "This place is crawling with Asurans."

"It's built just like Atlantis," Ronon says, his voice stronger, clearer, closer. "If you were going to hide there, where would you go?"

"Well that's completely different. Atlantis is mostly abandoned and-" He snaps his fingers as an idea hits him. "The underwater jumper bay. There should be no reason for the Asurans to be down there unless they've taken up an interest in oceanography. Which is doubtful."

He hears the distinct hum of Ronon's energy weapon being readied. At least they have one gun between them. "How far is it?"

"About fifty stories and half-a-mile from where we are now - if this place really is designed just like Atlantis."

"Good enough for me."

"And me as well," Teyla agrees, suddenly appearing out of the smoke. She's missing about half-a-foot of hair and has a nasty welt on one side of her face, but other than that she seems reasonably unharmed, considering the circumstances. "Ronon, if you will carry Elizabeth, I'll take point."

"You have a weapon?"

"Only my boot knife. The guards took the rest when they captured me and I do not see them here now."

"Take my gun," he tells her, handing it over as he too appears at Elizabeth's side, bleeding from half-a-dozen different cuts on each arm. "What about you, McKay?"

"I've got a life signs detector, but I've got no idea if the Asurans will even show up on it."

"Keep an eye on it just in case." He lifts Elizabeth into his arms, bridal style, and asks, "Which way?"

Rodney fumbles as he pulls the LSD out of his jacket, fingers slippery with blood and sweat. "What about John?"

"We're no good to him until we get Elizabeth someplace safe."

"But-" they can't just leave him. John would never leave any of them, not if there was a snowball's chance in hell they were still alive, and maybe not even then.

"He is an Ascended being. He will be able to take care of himself until we are in a position to help him. Now, which way to the underwater jumper bay?"

"But-"

"Rodney, we will come back for him," Teyla promises, placing a hand on his shoulder before gesturing down the hallway with Ronon's gun. "Now which way?"

Rodney runs a hand across his face. "Alright. You're right." He points down the far end of the hall, away from the Council Room and the source of all this destruction. "There should be a secondary staircase not far from here that will take us most of the way. Come on."

* * *

Rodney's never been more glad for John's habit of never taking the same route twice as he now. Between the knowledge of various shortcuts and secondary hallways he's gleaned from John's walkabouts and the LSD, they're able to avoid most of the Asurans they'd otherwise have run across on their way to the underwater jumper bay.

But one misstep is all they need, which is how they wind up trapped inside one of the jumpers as water floods the bay. The water doesn't seem to be any more of a deterrent to the Asurans' progress than the doors they'd been able to short circuit shut behind them, but the jumper's cloak seems to be giving them pause. (The cloak frequencies probably disrupt the bonds between nanites somehow - which, while worth noting for the Anti-Replicator Guns he's most definitely going to start working on the second he gets back to Atlantis, doesn't really change the fact that they're stuck.

(Or that the Replicators are bound to adapt to this impediment long before the cloak gives out.)

"Can you fly this thing?"

"Theoretically? Yes. When somebody's taking pot shots at us? Not so much."

"Are we not cloaked?" Teyla asks, riffling through the contents of the jumper, looking for something - anything - that they can use.

"Atlantis can detect a cloaked jumper. I'm betting these B-list wannabes can too."

"We must do something," Teyla declares, dropping the box she'd been digging through. "There is nothing here which we can use to help Elizabeth. We have to get back to Atlantis or, barring that, the nearest friendly planet."

"No hyperdrive," he reminds her.

"Then our only hope for escape is through the Stargate."

"Pretty much."

"Then we must find a way to do so, and quickly. Elizabeth has not yet woken and her pulse is getting slower. I fear that if we do not get her medical attention soon, we will lose her."

Rodney feels the blood rush from his face. Yes, as soon as he'd seen the extent of her injuries, he'd feared possibility, but to have someone else say it aloud brings it from justified fear to cold, heard reality. It's bad enough that John is gone again, captured by the Asurans this time, but if Elizabeth does die...

No. She can't die. She just can't. She's more than their leader, she's...

She's the one person who believed in him after that mess with Teal'c and Colonel Simmons a few years ago. She pulled strings and got him recalled from Russia without ever having met him. She had him instated as the CSO of the Expedition within an hour of their first initial interview. She changed his life, bringing him to the Pegasus galaxy. She gave him Atlantis. She gave him John.

Elizabeth can't die. She may be hopelessly, annoyingly, ludicrously naive; she may be physically incapable of seeing the bad in anyone or anything; she may be stubborn at the best of times and sanctimonious at the worst, but without all of those qualities, they never would have made it this far. Not by half.

"Yeah. Just let me..." Rodney mumbles, gesturing to the panel over Teyla's head. "The jumper's DHD should override the one in the Control Room, but we're going to need shields if we're going to try to fly this thing straight through the centre of the city to get there."

"Quickly, please."

"I know, I know, just... five minutes. I need five minutes if we're going to have a fighting chance of pulling this off."

"Pull what off?"

All three of them currently capable of it spin around to face the figure currently standing in the cockpit, looking as casually immaculate as he had when he'd stepped through th Gate.

"John," he breathes, unable to do or say more as relief floods through his veins. Elizabeth may still be in danger, but at least John's alright, so that's one less thing he has to worry about. It doesn't matter that John's Ascended now - that he's essentially invulnerable, - it's impossible not worry. Especially when the last he'd seen of his amator had been while the Replicators were doing their utmost best to test that invulnerability theory in the seconds before that bomb, or whatever it was, went off.

John beams at him before accepting Ronon's back-slapping hug.

"Sheppard, how'd you escape?"

"I'm an Ascended being-" he starts, smirking, before sputtering to a halt when his eyes fall on Elizabeth. "What happened?" he demands, brushing past Ronon and Teyla to kneel beside the bench where they've lain her.

She's almost as pale as what remains of her Ancient costume - what of it that isn't burned or bloodstained, that is. She's not showing any signs of stirring yet either, and is so far gone that even attempting to tend her injuries elicits little more than a faint, instinctive hiss of pain.

Teyla's right: Elizabeth is going to die and there's nothing anyone can do to stop it. Not even a man worshiped by half a galaxy as a god.

"A bomb went off as we were leaving the Council Chambers..." she begins slowly, as if she knows beforehand what weight her words will have.

John immediately blanches. "No," he says, hands already alight with his Ancient healing powers. "No, no, no."

"John...?"

"It wasn't a bomb. It was me."

Ronon looks at him skeptically. "You mean all that thunder and lightening...?"

"Was me, yes."

"How?"

"My control slipped. Just a little. But, I mean, I was kinda worried about what the Asurans would do to you guys. I mean, their programming kinda make the Wraith look cute and cuddly, so it it was an understandable worry, but I never meant for anything like this to happen."

Teyla kneels next to him and - gingerly - places an arm around his shoulders. "I know, John. You would never knowingly hurt any of us. But set that aside for the moment and think: is it possible for you to heal her?"

Already Elizabeth's burns have disappeared, leaving no trace of ever having been beyond the swaths of shiny, fresh and new pink skin on her face and peaking through the places where her clothes have burned away. But John bites his lower lip and shakes his head. "Something's still wrong. Her brain, I think. It's... swelling and I don't know how to reverse it or make it stop. We've got to get her back to Atlantis as soon as possible." He swallows audibly. "Carson will know what to do."

"McKay's working on it."

"What?" Rodney blinks, turning back towards the crystal panel he'd all but forgotten about in the aftermath of John's return. "Yes. Right. Give me another minute."

Ronon scowls at him. "You said it would only take five."

"Well forgive me for getting distracted!"

"Elizabeth doesn't have time for distractions!"

"Knock it off you two," John orders, climbing to his feet. "She's stable for now, so stop arguing and tell me how you wound up down here and what your plan is to get back to Atlantis." He pauses. "You guys do have a plan, right? 'Cause the only way out of here I'm seeing involves me really losing my cool and dipping into my reserve power, which basically gets twenty-seven planets the Death Star treatment, care of the knuckleheads upstairs. And as much as I like you guys, I promised I'd try to avoid that route if at all possible."

Ronon leans against the one of the bulkheads and crosses his arms. "We were going to fly through the Stargate."

"Asuras' porta?" he appears to consider this. "We'd need to convert the cloak into a shield-"

"McKay's working on it."

"-and a hell of a good pilot."

"We've got you."

"I am the best."

"So, do you think it can be done?"

"We're about to find out."

* * *

Turn's out, it can be done, if someone's crazy enough to fly a jumper through the Control Room window while the Gate's still dialling. Especially if their opponents are distracted by volleys of the drones John fires in their wake.

But there's nothing that can be done for Elizabeth. Not by that point. She'd been as good as dead the moment her head hit the floor and no act of god could ever have saved her.


End file.
